Here’s a fun fact for you. Did you know that a crucial step in making any LCD screen for your telly involves a bit of science that has even the experts stumped? That’s right: nobody knows how LCD TV screens are actually made. Read on, and we’ll explain.
Humans Invent has a fantastic piece up today exploring the mystery behind LCD screens, namely, the method boobtube manufacturers use to align the said liquid crystals in the display. In short: we know how to do it, via a brushing technique, but we still don’t know why on earth it actually works.
Is it static electricity? Is it the grooves in the cloth? Is it something even more chemically bonkers? “Another theory is that maybe we locally melt the polymer as we rub it, and tease the polymer chains out,” says Sharp’s director of optical imaging and display systems, Dr Harry Walton. “But no-one really knows.”
Check out the video below to see just how it’s done and hit the link below for the full story. It’s rather humbling to know that even in an age of dual-core processors in smartphones, we’re still guessing when it comes to gadgetry.
The mystery inside every LCD screen from Humans Invent on Vimeo.
(Via Humans Invent)
